X's & O's Football iPhoneReview

Share.

Madden too complicated for you?

By Levi Buchanan

Like videogame football but cannot get your head and hands around all the passes, plays, runs, and buttons required to play Madden NFL? Then you are an ideal candidate for X's & O's Football. This is a wholly casual football game that simplifies the experience down to a passing game, but still maintains the thrill of creating a breakaway play.

There are no licensed teams here. There are no players either. You just control a team of helmets against another team of helmets. When the game begins, you have the ball on the 20-yard line. By tapping left and right arrows at the bottom of the screen, you see a series of possible plays, represented by yellow arrows on-screen. Pick the play you think has a chance of gaining yardage and then tap your QB. The ball is hiked and then you tap where you want to pass the ball. If you manage to get the ball in the waiting, uh, grill of one of your receiver helmets, you tilt your device to guide the helmet out of the clutches of the opposing team.

There is no learning curve to X's & O's. If you know football, you'll get it within the first few plays. But just because this is casual, doesn't mean it's a pushover. The other team puts out a real effort to stop you from advancing. Sometimes they will shut you down. But if you're quick, you can get that breakaway moment and scream into the end zone. This kind of accessibility opens the game up to any pigskin fan -- and it deserves a wide audience for being clever enough to be so easy to pick up, but not be an absolute pushover.

X's is a cute game. Come on, little red and blue helmets? That's cute. The game is bright, colorful, and smooth. The sound effects are great, too.

The Verdict

Skyworks' X's & O's Football is as casual a football game as you can get without devolving into a simple swiping game like, well, Skyworks' QB Pass Football. But unlike that snoozer, X's has all the charm of one of those classic magnetized football games of yesteryear and is twice as fun to play.